Miscellany: January 2007 Archives

So this kid named Ryan sends a message to me through my never-used MySpace page (I took one out to park my name…please don’t send emails to me there, or ask me to be your friend or whatever MySpacy type of stuff you enjoy) telling me he enjoys my films, and asking for some advice about film school.

I tell him about this site, give him the best advice I can, and that’s that, I figure.

But no. See, this kid is also in touch with James Gunn (who wrote The Specials), and James tells him I’m married with kids, but my MySpace page says I’m single with no kids…so this guy now wants to know if I’m the REAL Craig Mazin, and could I tell him some fact about James Gunn that he could verify with James Gunn in order to prove that I’m really me and not some nefarious Craig Mazin impersonator.

At this point, I should I have just walked away, because I’m thinking there’s now a 60% chance that this kid is James Gunn or Jamie Kennedy or some other person who knows me, and they’re just screwing with me.

Still, he’s purportedly in college, I’m trying to be a nice guy, so I email him a fact about James that I think isn’t public.

Then I email him again to point out that pretending to be Craig Mazin has to be the stupidest charade possible. I know this, because I am Craig Mazin, and there don’t appear to be any perks or fringes to this gig, like models or concert tickets or blow. Why would anyone even bother?

He emails me back with the following.

I’m waiting for James to get back to me about the Astroburger thing, but wasn’t that on the DVD?? Even I knew about that. Why would Craig Mazin get two things wrong on his profile? If this IS the real Craig Mazin, then you’ve got to put SOMETHING on your page proving it’s the real you. Everyone I know to be legit (James, his wife Jenna, Nathan Fillion from Slither) has something proving it’s them. Take a picture of yourself in front of your MySpace page on your computer. Or something. For every real celebrity on the internet, there are 1,000 people pretending to be them. You know that. Why do they do it? Your guess is as good as mine. Honestly, take a picture of yourself in front of your page.

Take a PICTURE in front of my MySpace page proving that it’s ME? Hey, why don’t I just drop everything else I’m doing and DRIVE TO YOUR HOUSE?

Then I could have lunch with you! You could see my driver’s license, and then touch me on the arm. If that’s not good enough, I could leave some hair behind for DNA testing…

Yes, the “single” and “no kids” thing is suspicious, because no one would EVER create a MySpace page and then NOT FILL IT IN ACCURATELY, right?

Maybe when I built that page, I didn’t want people to know I had kids. Maybe I didn’t want them to know I had a wife.

Maybe…

…wait, this is starting to make me look bad.

Honestly, I don’t know why it was filled out wrong.

I fixed it now, because I’m pretty much your employee now, Ryan. My job? Proving that I really am the oft-imitated but never-equaled Craig Mazin!

Like I said, I want to believe this is just a put-on, but this guy’s MySpace page is pretty detailed. I know, I know, maybe I’m as gullible as he is suspicious, but he seems real enough to me.

So, Ryan, if you’re reading this…

…this is not the way to go about winning friends and getting ahead in life.

For the rest of you, I know, I know…things have been sluggish around here. Stupid work getting in the way. I’ve got a ton of Q&A’s built up that I’m going to answer in one big burst, and then after that, an article that a number of you have requested: a primer to explain what the hell the issues are facing the WGA in the upcoming negotiations, whether or not I think we are going to have a strike, and what this all means in simple, easy-to-understand non-wonky language.

But first, I have to send a stool sample to Ryan.